The Dilemma by B. A. Paris

A special thank you to Edelweiss, NetGalley and Macmillan/St. Martin's Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Livia is turning forty and is throwing herself a party. And not just any party, one that she has been planning for the last twenty years. The only person that will not be in attendance is her daughter, Marnie, who is in Hong Kong. But Livia has been keeping a secret from Adam because of the effect it will have on their lives. She has decided to wait until after the festivities to tell him, and is actually relieved that Marnie won't be there.

Adam wants the evening to be perfect for Livia because she never got to have a wedding. Livia and Adam were married in a registry office when they were teens because Livia was pregnant and subsequently disowned by her parents. On the day of the party, Adam learns of some news that could not only ruin the party, but devastate their lives, so he decides to keep it to himself until after the guests leave.

The Dilemma is a departure for B. A. Paris in that it is more of a domestic drama versus a typical thriller. At its core is "the dilemma" and it is an emotional punch right to the gut. Are the characters acting out of love and wanting to protect their family, or deception and being self-serving?

I ultimately struggled with the book for both it being marketed incorrectly as a thriller, and with the fact that the dilemma itself was not believable—Adam choosing to keep a life-altering secret from his wife is simply not plausible. The book was also too long. There were pages and pages where nothing much was happening, or that it was repetitive. I don't know whether this was because the story only takes place over a day and Paris needed to fill the pages, or because of the limited setting which was their home.

Paris did redeem herself with the ending—it didn't end the way that I thought it was going to.

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B. A. PARIS is the internationally bestselling author of Behind Closed Doors, The Breakdown, and Bring Me Back. She has worked both in finance and as a teacher and has five daughters. The Dilemma is her fourth novel.

Paris grew up in England, but has spend most of her adult life in France.